The Brooklyn Nets’ willingness to fall out of the Dwight Howard sweepstakes freed them up to search for another big catch and take care of home; the Nets in orchestrated a trade for Joe Johnson and retained several key players to create one of the NBA’s best starting lineups.

Turns out, point guard Deron Williams is to thank for the Nets’ quick thinking.

Williams, who agreed to a five-year, $98.7 million deal with Brooklyn, warned general manager Billy King that the Nets’ roster could suffer if he continued to wait for a feasible Howard deal to materialize.

"One thing Deron did say to me, he said, 'Please, just don't wait on Dwight. We can't wait and not have a team,'" King said in NBA TV’s “The Association: Brooklyn Nets” (via ESPNNewYork.com).

"The team of Brooklyn is bigger than one person. I owed it to the organization, I owed it to our fans, I owed it to Deron and the players that we have to build for Brooklyn, and we went forward and built our team."

King, at one point, offered the Orlando Magic nearly every asset on Brooklyn's roster; he was willing to part with center Brook Lopez, power forward Kris Humphries, second-year guard MarShon Brooks and four first-round picks in order to land Howard, one of the NBA’s premier big men.

Heeding Williams’ warning, King instead executed a $330 million roster overhaul that included re-signing Williams, Lopez, Humphries and Gerald Wallace. The team also brought over the remaining $90 million on Johnson’s contract in a trade with the Atlanta Hawks.

Howard, who made it known Brooklyn’s interest was reciprocated, did not receive his initial demand of a trade to the Nets. He was later dealt to the Los Angeles Lakers, where he will play this season with Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash, Pau Gasol and Metta World Peace on this offseason’s most talked about team.